Elfmama: Tell SIL#1 to go to howmanyofme.com and look up how many people share his name. So when the billing company calls he can say "there are X number of people in the US with that name, so unless you can provide proof this debt is mine I will not be paying."

*there's 984 people with my name, and then another 1191 when using a slightly different spelling. My SIL(same name different spelling) has ended up my credit report before(address she and my brother lived at was listed with mine)

If I use my spelling of "Katie" (that is, "Kaiti") I am the only person in the USA with my same first & last name. If I go with Katherine instead, I am one of 28. Cool!

Logged

What part of v_e = \sqrt{\frac{2GM}{r}} don't you understand? It's only rocket science!

"The problem with re-examining your brilliant ideas is that more often than not, you discover they are the intellectual equivalent of saying, 'Hold my beer and watch this!'" - Cindy Couture

If I use my spelling of "Katie" (that is, "Kaiti") I am the only person in the USA with my same first & last name. If I go with Katherine instead, I am one of 28. Cool!

OK, I'm not in the USA, I'm in the UK - but I tried this anyway. And in both my maiden name and my married name there's only me. I gave it the full name I use, Forename Maiden Name Married Name, and it had a conniption fit and fell over so I think it's fair to say there's only me in that too.

If I use my spelling of "Katie" (that is, "Kaiti") I am the only person in the USA with my same first & last name. If I go with Katherine instead, I am one of 28. Cool!

OK, I'm not in the USA, I'm in the UK - but I tried this anyway. And in both my maiden name and my married name there's only me. I gave it the full name I use, Forename Maiden Name Married Name, and it had a conniption fit and fell over so I think it's fair to say there's only me in that too.

Why don't we have this in the UK? That's a cool site!

Kaiti, we must be the Specialest of Special Snowflakes!

Me too! I'm in Australia, there is "1 or fewer" people with my name in the US.

If I use my spelling of "Katie" (that is, "Kaiti") I am the only person in the USA with my same first & last name. If I go with Katherine instead, I am one of 28. Cool!

OK, I'm not in the USA, I'm in the UK - but I tried this anyway. And in both my maiden name and my married name there's only me. I gave it the full name I use, Forename Maiden Name Married Name, and it had a conniption fit and fell over so I think it's fair to say there's only me in that too.

Why don't we have this in the UK? That's a cool site!

Kaiti, we must be the Specialest of Special Snowflakes!

Me too! I'm in Australia, there is "1 or fewer" people with my name in the US.

SIL#1 is getting those kind of calls from a medical billing company. They want him to give them $800. They say that because of HIPAA privacy rules, they cannot tell him who the doctor was, what was done, where it was done, or when it was done. The ONLY information they will give him is that somebody with HisFirstName HisLastName owes somebody money for doing something medically.

He has had minor surgery in the recent past, but believes that he covered all of the copay bills that he was supposed to pay; his insurance was paying the lion's share of it.

So they're confident enough that this bill belongs to this specific HisFirstName HisLastName that they expect him to pay $800, but not so confident that they can tell him anything at all about his own (supposedly) medical treatment. Because of HIPAA. OK...

If HIPAA forbids giving a patient information about that patient's own medical treatment, then doctor's appointments must get really confusing. Patient: "So should I be worried about this mole?"Doctor: "I can't talk to you about any moles you may or may not have. That would be a violation of HIPAA."Patient: "But it's my mole. The whole reason I made an appointment was to figure out if it's benign or not."Doctor: "I can't discuss the reasons for my patients' appointments! HIPAA!"Patient: "But, Doctor, I just want to know if this mole is dangerous. Does it need to be treated?"Doctor: "I can't talk to you about that! HIPAA!!"Patient: "Did you even look at it? Why did I bother coming?"Doctor: "I can't talk to you about anything I might or not have looked at, or why you came to my office! That's what I've been telling you! Your medical privacy must be protected!! HIPAA!!! HIPAA!!!! HIPAA!!!!!"Patient: "...Either you're going insane or I am."Doctor: "Who told you that?!?"

Hilarious!

Seriously, though, I work in medical insurance, and the billing company here either doesn't understand how HIPAA works or is lying through its teeth. If the billing company isn't willing to possibly violate HIPAA, then they're not sure that the son-in-law is the patient, which is a wonderful reason not to pay.

Rob

Logged

"In all of mankind's history, there has never been more damage done than by someone who 'thought they were doing the right thing'." -- Lucy, Peanuts

If I use my spelling of "Katie" (that is, "Kaiti") I am the only person in the USA with my same first & last name. If I go with Katherine instead, I am one of 28. Cool!

OK, I'm not in the USA, I'm in the UK - but I tried this anyway. And in both my maiden name and my married name there's only me. I gave it the full name I use, Forename Maiden Name Married Name, and it had a conniption fit and fell over so I think it's fair to say there's only me in that too.

Why don't we have this in the UK? That's a cool site!

Kaiti, we must be the Specialest of Special Snowflakes!

Me too! I'm in Australia, there is "1 or fewer" people with my name in the US.

Very cool site! I am the ONLY person with my name in the whole US.

A little more off topic conversation.

There are 1734 people with my last name in the US and it is the 17483rd most common last name. I love how close the two numbers are.

If I use my spelling of "Katie" (that is, "Kaiti") I am the only person in the USA with my same first & last name. If I go with Katherine instead, I am one of 28. Cool!

OK, I'm not in the USA, I'm in the UK - but I tried this anyway. And in both my maiden name and my married name there's only me. I gave it the full name I use, Forename Maiden Name Married Name, and it had a conniption fit and fell over so I think it's fair to say there's only me in that too.

Why don't we have this in the UK? That's a cool site!

Kaiti, we must be the Specialest of Special Snowflakes!

Me too! I'm in Australia, there is "1 or fewer" people with my name in the US.

Very cool site! I am the ONLY person with my name in the whole US.

As am I. SIL is one of 30 (one of whom is his father). And now I'm wondering if his father is the one who incurred the charges; he has stolen SIL's identity before.

Logged

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~Common sense is not a gift, but a curse. Because thenyou have to deal with all the people who don't have it. ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

If I use my spelling of "Katie" (that is, "Kaiti") I am the only person in the USA with my same first & last name. If I go with Katherine instead, I am one of 28. Cool!

OK, I'm not in the USA, I'm in the UK - but I tried this anyway. And in both my maiden name and my married name there's only me. I gave it the full name I use, Forename Maiden Name Married Name, and it had a conniption fit and fell over so I think it's fair to say there's only me in that too.

Why don't we have this in the UK? That's a cool site!

Kaiti, we must be the Specialest of Special Snowflakes!

Me too! I'm in Australia, there is "1 or fewer" people with my name in the US.

Very cool site! I am the ONLY person with my name in the whole US.

A little more off topic conversation.

There are 1734 people with my last name in the US and it is the 17483rd most common last name. I love how close the two numbers are.

There are only 373 people in the USA with my last name. And I'm fairly sure I'm related to all of them! By marriage anyway. If I use my spelling of my first name, I'm the only one. Although there are two other people with the more common spelling. (I wonder how often they update. DH's aunt had the more common spelling, but she died last year.)

If I use my spelling of "Katie" (that is, "Kaiti") I am the only person in the USA with my same first & last name. If I go with Katherine instead, I am one of 28. Cool!

OK, I'm not in the USA, I'm in the UK - but I tried this anyway. And in both my maiden name and my married name there's only me. I gave it the full name I use, Forename Maiden Name Married Name, and it had a conniption fit and fell over so I think it's fair to say there's only me in that too.

Why don't we have this in the UK? That's a cool site!

Kaiti, we must be the Specialest of Special Snowflakes!

Me too! I'm in Australia, there is "1 or fewer" people with my name in the US.

Very cool site! I am the ONLY person with my name in the whole US.

A little more off topic conversation.

There are 1734 people with my last name in the US and it is the 17483rd most common last name. I love how close the two numbers are.

There are only 373 people in the USA with my last name. And I'm fairly sure I'm related to all of them! By marriage anyway. If I use my spelling of my first name, I'm the only one. Although there are two other people with the more common spelling. (I wonder how often they update. DH's aunt had the more common spelling, but she died last year.)

The data they use for this program is so old I'd be skeptical about its accuracy. It uses data from the 1990 census. A lot of things can change in 22 years.

Elfmama: Tell SIL#1 to go to howmanyofme.com and look up how many people share his name. So when the billing company calls he can say "there are X number of people in the US with that name, so unless you can provide proof this debt is mine I will not be paying."

Thank you for the new timekiller!

I am fascinated with this, especially how common certain last names are! I know 2 families with 117 or fewer people in the US.

I used to take orders from store owners over the phone for all the stuff drug stores sell. There was one guy who always asked for "cigarettes in the red package". I don't smoke, but even if I did, I'd need more than that - size of cigarette, number of packages in the case, and, oh, I dunno - how about a NAME?

Whereupon he'd tell me to "go look on the shelf". Now, I wasn't allowed to go into our warehouse, and even if I could just leave my desk and go run upstairs, there were certain things that had VERY restricted access. Cigarettes were one of them. I'd try to tell him this, and he'd get exasperated, saying "just go check! How hard is it to go look on the shelf?"

"Since you seem completely incapable of it, you tell me."

That said, I'm guessing Marlboros.

I'd say marlboros too but here most cigarette companies have one product with red packaging, usually indicating their strongest (most amount of nicotine) cigarette.

Marlboros are red and white. Dorals are solid red. I'd have guessed Dorals, but Marlboros are more popular.

The new packaging rollout for tobacco products has begun in Australia. I had a look when buying a phone recharge card at the tobacco counter and the new packaging is coming into effect, everything tobacco is that dark military green with interestingly gruesome picture warnings on it. I imagine the desk people will be having spirited conversations over what colour a brand was with a customer because the customer can't remember the strength (strength is colour coded to a paticular brand). You have 2 choices, green with an ugly picture or green with an even uglier picture.

They should have gone the Denis Leary route with packaging, it would have been more entertaining.

I actually tried to MAKE this happen for a patron...and after struggling for ten minutes decided that, while it was something I COULD do, it was also something waaaaaaay beyond my job description.

As a former children's librarian, I am more than used to helping kids zip in and out of snowsuits, clip up boots, sweaters with snaps and so on. Was NEVER a problem for any of us to help someone with a zipper on a raincoat.

I have never, EVER had to do this for an adult...until yesterday.

Cassie is overweight and she selects clothing items that are somewhat smaller than she is. I will concede that Cassie is probably struggling with emtional and intellectual issues as well as financial problems which lead her to shop at thrift stores or depend on coat drives. But I have been part of coat drives and I know that when an agency hands these things out, they try to match the patron with an item that FITS.

So yesterday was cold and we were closing and here comes Cassie.

"Pllllleeeeeeaaaaassssssseeeee zip my jacket for me."

Folks, I gave it my best shot. But I could not get that thing to stay in place long enough to zip it up. It didn't help that Cassie kept moving, twisting around and generally not helping. I asked her to at least hold the bottom parts of her coat together so I had a shot at getting the zipper to slide, but she would hold it for three seconds, get distracted and stare into space and let go of the coat just as I was about to zip. After ten minutes of this and me nearly ripping the zipper out, I had to concede defeat.

Found out later that Cassie and her entourage were downstairs, blocking the door while two of them held the coat parts tightly together and friend #3 zipped. My supervisor suggested to me that this was really not in my job description.